


the kind of love i've been dreaming of

by katplanet



Series: sleep to the freezing [1]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Enthusiastic Consent, Explicit Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Klaus Hargreeves Gets A Hug, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 07:29:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18331430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katplanet/pseuds/katplanet
Summary: “You agreed to be a designated driver,” Klaus says, because of course he’s as good at this as he is at every other thing he and Dave have done in bed together. “All your stupid Varsity Lacrosse friends started annoying you, so you were looking for someone else to talk to. And lo and behold, a sad twink in a crop top, alone on the couch with a half-finished vodka cranberry.”“What’s a twink?”“Me,” Klaus says. “I’m a twink.”





	the kind of love i've been dreaming of

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive me if I get details wrong about military life during the Vietnam War and/or prostate orgasms. You know, the important stuff.
> 
> Content warning for a brief discussion of what Klaus suspects was a sexual encounter when he was underage and under the influence, and categorically couldn't give consent. That line in the show about Klaus not remembering his first sexual experience was grim as hell.

“Almost anyone can do it,” Klaus says. “Seriously. You could do it.”

“When I was a teenager, maybe.”

Dave has Klaus sprawled out over most of his body like an awful bony blanket, both of them still a little sweaty from exertion and the nighttime humidity seeping into their rented room. When either one of them moves, their skin sticks in uncomfortable places. It reminds Dave of being in a sauna, overwarm and dizzy with minimal clothing, except he doesn’t want to leave.

“It takes practice,” Klaus says, like he’s talking about riding a bike. “You have to learn what your body wants, and then do that to yourself, like, a lot, until you get good at it.”

“This just sounds like an excuse to jerk off.”

“Not jerk off,” Klaus says, poking Dave in the chest for emphasis, next to where he has his head resting on Dave’s shoulder. “You have to finger yourself and nothing else. Or you can shove something else up there, whatever’s convenient. I had good luck with a toothbrush handle.”

“Please tell me it wasn’t the toothbrush you used on your teeth.”

“Nah, not my own. Usually whichever of my siblings I was mad at.”

Dave snorts. “That’s disgusting.”

“Hey, I didn’t get into petty theft until I was at least fifteen. I was working with what I had.”

“There’s no way that was your best option.”

“Yeah, no, I’m only kidding. I had a dedicated sex toothbrush hidden in my room. But I may have misled my brothers once.”

“Once?”

“A few times. Regularly.”

Dave laughs, which is solidly half of what he does when he’s with Klaus. They laugh while they walk, while they eat, while they fuck, while they’re falling asleep under heavy, wet blankets of jungle.

“My point,” Klaus says, waving his hand around before flopping it back onto Dave, “is prostate orgasms. We’ll get you there.”

“Maybe when we’re not surrounded by dozens of other men every day.”

“I can think of no better time.”

“Ha, ha.”

Klaus snuggles closer to Dave, his arm sliding down until his palm cups Dave's upper thigh. Dave, unlike some people, has to take actual breaks. But Klaus never seems to mind, just sidles up against Dave and talks to him.

If Klaus tends to deliberately bring up sexy things while Dave is recuperating, and if Dave indulges him in it, well. They're on a schedule.

“I just think,” Dave says, shuffling his hips at the proximity of Klaus’s hand, “the learning curve is steeper than you give it credit for, is all.”

“That’s what the practice is for. I mean, you saw, it was easy enough for me our first time.”

“Our first time was not  _ your _ first time.”

Klaus barks a laugh. “I wish. First time in a while, though. I was out of practice.”

“What's  _ a while _ ?”

“Um.” Klaus wrinkles his nose. “I'd been here, what, a month and a half?”

“Give or take.”

“A month and a half, then.”

Dave laughs at that, tugs Klaus tighter against his chest. “Thank goodness you took the lead.”

Klaus freezes, and props himself up just enough to see Dave's face. “Was our first time  _ your _ first time?”

“With a man, yeah.”

“Oh my god,” Klaus says, staring at Dave in naked wonder. “I would have shown off more if I'd known.”

“I don’t think I could have handled that.”

“I really never would have guessed. You were incredible.”

“You made it easy,” Dave says, because for all his nerves in the lead up, sleeping with Klaus had been revelatory in its simplicity. Klaus had gasped and praised when something Dave did worked for him, guided with words and kisses when something didn't. He'd used all his knowledge and experience and taught Dave how to play him like an instrument. Dave isn't sure if any of it would translate to another person's body, and he doesn't particularly care.

“Sweet talker,” Klaus says, fond. He drops a kiss on Dave's collarbone and lays his head back down lower on Dave’s chest, his arm thrown across Dave's stomach.

Dave plays with Klaus's hair in the quiet, because that's something else that Dave has learned, that Klaus has taught him - Klaus melts with hands in his hair, or rubbing his shoulders, benign touches that Dave can, dangerously, imagine giving Klaus in a sunny dining room after a weekend lie-in. He thinks Klaus would appreciate it, even out of bed. Klaus once told Dave about a brother (wistfully, in the past tense, smiling into the middle distance like he was making a private joke) who used to pet his hair when they were young and Klaus had had, in his words, a  _ rough night _ .

Dave has surmised from what little Klaus has given him that Klaus used to have  _ rough nights _ a lot.

“You said,” Dave says, “you wished it was your first time, with me.”

Klaus keeps his mouth shut at that, but he starts rubbing his palm up and down Dave’s stomach, which Dave suspects is a distraction attempt.

“Sorry,” he says, when Klaus stays quiet. “I shouldn’t pry.”

“No, no.” Klaus shakes his head, his hair tickling Dave’s chest. “I’m actually not sure what I meant when I said that. I’m thinking it over.”

“You can think out loud, if you want to.”

Dave feels Klaus smile with his cheek pressed to the top of Dave’s ribs.

“I don’t know,” Klaus says. “I don’t care about virginity, or anything like that. Other people do, which is fine. But I think it’s experience gained, not something lost.”

“Sure. Still,” Dave adds, careful, “people get nervous doing something new for the first time, especially when it's with another person.”

“Yeah,” Klaus says, and goes silent again.

“My first time was when I was nineteen,” Dave offers. “This sweet girl in my class at college. We were both thinking a lot about weddings and babies, at the time.”

“Very fifties of you both. Did it end tragically?”

“Nah, it just wasn’t meant to be. Last I heard from her, she was living in San Francisco with two lesbians and four cats.”

“Oh, I love her.”

“She’d love you, too.”

“You’ll have to introduce me,” Klaus says, like it’s nothing, which doesn’t help with Dave’s Sunday morning kitchen fantasy.

“I will.” Dave kisses the top of Klaus’s head and combs their conversation for something to change the subject.

“I don’t remember my first time,” Klaus says.

Dave tamps down his first instinct, which is to ask Klaus for the names and last known addresses of everyone who ever treated him like anything less than the treasure he is, and says, “How old were you?”

“Fourteen,” Klaus says, his voice sounding light in an entirely different way than it does when he’s actually happy. “I think. I must have been, I didn’t start blacking out until I was fourteen. I used to try to see how early in the night I could start forgetting things and still end up back in my bed the next morning. I woke up delightfully sore, once, so I assume something must have gone on downstairs the night before.”

“If we’re talking about experience gained,” Dave says, hoping he sounds more diplomatic than he feels, “I don’t think you have to count that, if you don’t want to.”

“I learned that you shouldn’t buy heroin from a guy who tells you to call him ‘Cash,’ so there’s that.”

“Klaus,” Dave says, “that’s horrible.”

“Yeah,” Klaus sighs. “I guess it is, objectively.”

“Really. Whoever did that to you should be cannon fodder.”

Klaus wraps his arm tighter around Dave’s waist. “The first time I  _ do _ remember was fun, though. This cute boy and his girlfriend, who had  _ the _ most glorious strap-on, oh my god, my toes are curling just thinking about it. We went for  _ hours _ .”

“Where are you from, again?”

“The future,” Klaus says, propping his chin up on Dave’s ribs and beaming at him. “It’s fun. You’ll like it.”

Dave thinks back, not for the first time, to the bleary, just-awake memory of Klaus at the foot of his bed, clutching a bloody towel to his waist, nothing but a penny lane coat and a leather briefcase to his name, and says, “I bet I will.”

Klaus scoots up the bed until his face is level with Dave’s and kisses him, slow and deep, his hand sliding up Dave’s chest to cup his jaw. “You,” he says, when he breaks away, “are incredible.”

“ _ You’re _ incredible.”

“No, dear, take the compliment.”

“Fine.” Dave nudges his nose against Klaus’s. “Thank you.”

Klaus hums and reaches down to tug his underwear down over his skinny hips. “I’m either getting comfortable,” he says, “or gearing up for round two. Up to you.”

“Round two sounds nice,” Dave says, fitting his hands on either side of Klaus’s waist. “C’mere, darlin’.”

Klaus preens the way he does whenever Dave tries out some silly pet name on him, and hoists himself up and over Dave, his hands braced on Dave’s pecs.

“For what it’s worth,” Dave tells him, “I wish I could have been your first time, too.”

“Yeah?” Klaus grins and shimmies his hips down into Dave’s lap. “You woulda treated me right?”

Dave smooths his hands up Klaus’s arms until he has his palms on Klaus’s jaw. “You know I would have.”

Klaus’s face softens, and he leans down to kiss Dave. “Tell me about it,” he says, his breath on Dave’s lips.

Dave knows he’s blushing, because Klaus gets a very particular sly smile whenever he makes Dave blush. “Well,” he says, trying to keep his voice steady, “I would have taken your underwear off for you, for starters.”

“Ooh,” Klaus crows, “do it!” And he rolls off of Dave onto his back, grabs his underwear from amongst the hotel sheets, and tugs them back up his legs.

“I mean,” Dave says, getting up on his hands and knees, “that’s not what I’d lead with.”

Klaus smiles, beatific, and throws his hands up on the pillow, ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ on either side of his head. “Take me through it, baby.”

Dave crawls over until he’s between Klaus’s thighs and settles his weight down, his arms bracketing Klaus’s chest. “How did you meet people? Parties, mostly?”

“You agreed to be a designated driver,” Klaus says immediately, because of course he’s as good at this as he is at every other thing he and Dave have done in bed together. “All your stupid Varsity Lacrosse friends started annoying the shit out of you, so you were looking for someone else to talk to. And lo and behold, a sad twink in a crop top, alone on the couch with a half-finished vodka cranberry.”

“What’s a twink?”

“Me,” Klaus says. “I’m a twink.”

“Well, you look like you need company.”

“And I’m  _ gorgeous _ ,” Klaus purrs. “And smart, and witty, and charming.”

“Really making me stretch my imagination, there.”

Klaus scoffs, but he’s smiling. “And you’re sitting there talking to me, and you’re like, my  _ god _ , I have to take this ethereal creature somewhere private and make exquisite love to him.”

“You took the words right out of my mouth.”

“And your parents! Your parents are out of town!” Klaus flings his arms around Dave’s neck. “You have the house to yourself for the whole weekend. You tell your friends to go fuck themselves, they can get home in taxi cabs. And you gather me into your, uh, your ‘56 Chevy, and you whisk me away.”

“I won’t even have to sneak you in through my bedroom window.”

“No, you get handsy all the way up the stairs like a perfect gentleman.”

Dave dips down and kisses Klaus’s jaw, the long curve of his neck. “I don’t want to push,” he says, because things are just coming out of his mouth, now. This is what Klaus does to him. “We don’t have to do anything.”

Klaus runs his hands over Dave’s broad shoulders. “That,” he says, his voice low in Dave’s ear, “is exactly why I want to do all kinds of things.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Klaus turns his head and catches Dave’s mouth in a kiss, chaste, shy. “I’ll tell you if I don’t like something. I swear.”

Dave presses his forehead to Klaus’s. “Kiss me again.”

Klaus moans and does as he’s told, shuffling his body to get even more of himself underneath Dave. They kiss, gentle pushes and pulls of lips, rare slips of tongue, worlds away from the way they usually make out when they’re in bed together. Dave likes Klaus’s wild, uninhibited kisses, but he likes these kisses too. He can’t imagine a kiss he wouldn’t like if it came from Klaus.

Eventually, Dave pulls away and noses down behind Klaus’s ear, catches Klaus’s earlobe in his lips and sucks.

“Oh,” Klaus breathes. “Oh, that’s cheating. You wouldn’t know I liked that.”

“I’d figure it out,” Dave tells him. “I’d kiss you everywhere.”

“Promises, promises.”

Dave lifts some of his weight off of Klaus and starts mouthing down his throat. Klaus arches up into it, so Dave keeps going, nips at Klaus’s collarbones, nuzzles down to his chest. He tugs a nipple between his teeth and Klaus groans, spreads his legs a little wider, as beautifully responsive as he always is. His fingers find their way into Dave’s hair, and Dave turns his head to kiss Klaus’s wrist, the veins and bone jutting out under his delicate skin.

“Is this the part where you take my underwear off?” Klaus asks, moving his hips in circles underneath Dave’s chest.

Dave grins and kisses Klaus’s belly. “Almost.”

Klaus throws his head back and whines when Dave presses his mouth against him through cotton. He’s blood-hot under Dave’s tongue, and Dave can feel with the tip of his nose where Klaus is making a wet spot in the fabric.

“Fuck,” Klaus moans, rocking into Dave’s mouth. “Please.”

“That,” Dave says, his lips still tucked against Klaus, “is where I take your underwear off.”

Klaus laughs above him and lifts his hips so Dave can tug the elastic back down his legs. Dave tosses the underwear somewhere across the room and stares down at Klaus, splayed out underneath him, hard and already a little desperate.

“I should probably be self-conscious at this point,” Klaus breathes. “You’ll have to use your imagination.”

“You don’t have to be.” Dave runs his hands up the insides of Klaus’s thighs. “You never have to be embarrassed. You’re beautiful. I’ve never seen anyone as beautiful as you.”

Klaus shuts his eyes, and Dave worries he’s overdone it until Klaus slides a palm down his own belly and wraps a hand around himself. “Maybe I’m not self-conscious, after all.”

Dave lets Klaus touch himself for a minute, sits back with his hands on Klaus’s legs and watches the way he tenses on each downstroke, the furrow in his brow as he concentrates on the feeling.

“Show me how you like it,” Dave says, the way Klaus said it to him the first time they were together like this, and Klaus speeds up his hand, quick and sharp, sweat just starting to glisten on his chest.

A few more strokes, and Dave touches Klaus’s forearm to slow him down. Klaus opens his eyes again and looks up at Dave with blown-out pupils, his lips still red from kissing. He lets go of himself and pulls Dave’s hand down instead. Dave starts a steady rhythm, a pattern of squeezes and twists he knows will get Klaus going, and Klaus pants for breath, braces his heels on either side of Dave and starts snapping his hips up to meet Dave halfway.

“Don’t let me finish like this,” Klaus says, completely undermining himself with the way he works his body into Dave’s hand. “I want you to fuck me.”

“Are you sure?”

Klaus groans and grabs at Dave’s shoulders. “I am so, so sure, Dave,  _ please _ .”

Dave kisses Klaus’s cheek and lets go of him. Klaus makes a big show of pouting about it, but his eyes are bright as he watches Dave shift his weight onto his knees, inch backwards on the mattress until his shoulders are between Klaus’s legs. Dave lifts one of Klaus’s ankles onto his shoulder, then the other, and Klaus angles his pelvis to give Dave a good look at him.

“Take off your underwear, first,” Klaus says, making his voice sweet, tremulously quiet. “I want to see you.”

Klaus’s ankle is right next to Dave’s mouth, so he kisses it. He doesn’t think he could bring himself to move from between Klaus’s legs even if he wanted to, but he tugs the waistband of his briefs down over his hips and adjusts himself, hard again just from watching Klaus feel good. Klaus bites his lip and hooks his heels higher on Dave’s shoulders, which is a little overacted, but flattering all the same.

“Is it going to-”

“Klaus, if you ask me whether it’s going to fit, I’m kicking you out of bed.”

Klaus cackles, and Dave laughs too, pressing his forehead to Klaus’s calf. He uses the break in tension to wiggle his underwear ungracefully the rest of the way down and off his legs. When he looks back up, Klaus has a finger tucked inside himself, where he’s still slick and open from an hour ago. That’s always a lovely thing to watch, so Dave puts his hands on Klaus’s thighs and doesn’t interrupt.

“I would have had plenty of experience doing this part myself,” Klaus says, still grinning. “But if you’d wanted to help, I wouldn’t have stopped you.”

Dave beckons for their tub of vaseline on the nightstand, which Klaus grabs and tosses to him. He sets it on the mattress next to him and guides Klaus’s finger out of his body. He laces his fingers with Klaus’s, just because he can. He puts his other hand on Klaus’s waist and ducks down to nibble at Klaus’s thigh, pale olive and warm against his lips. Klaus sighs, so Dave kisses higher, and higher, until he has his face buried between Klaus’s thighs, nothing but heat and musk and Klaus’s soft begging somewhere far away.

On a whim, Dave presses the flat of his tongue against Klaus and drags it up until he can dip the point of it just inside Klaus. Klaus squeezes his fingers tighter around Dave’s and shoves his other hand into Dave’s hair, holding him in place while he works his tongue against the token resistance Klaus’s body puts up. He switches in a few hard, wet kisses with all the pressure of his mouth fluttering against Klaus’s sensitive skin, and Klaus moans, kneading and tugging with the hand in Dave’s curls.

“This,” Klaus chokes out, “is not something I had experience doing myself.”

Dave laughs, which makes Klaus moan harder. He tugs Dave closer, and Dave hums with his mouth pressed against Klaus; it’s not as effective as humming with Klaus halfway down his throat, but Klaus seems to like it, anyway, pushing back into Dave’s face with quick rolls of his hips.

As soon as Klaus’s legs start quivering, Dave pulls back and drops kisses all over Klaus’s thighs. He takes Klaus’s hand out of his hair and links his fingers with that one, too, leaving Klaus with his legs over Dave’s shoulders, gasping for breath, squeezing down on both of Dave’s hands.

“Does that feel good?” Dave asks him.

Klaus nods, frantic. “Yes, I’ve - I’ve never -”

Dave knows on a rational level that Klaus has not  _ never _ , because Dave has done it himself more than a few times, but Klaus is trembling underneath him, stunned like Dave’s just opened a door that Klaus didn’t even know existed, and it does something to Dave. Dave’s angry, mostly - angry that what they’re doing isn’t real, that Klaus wasn’t always handled with the care he deserves, that Dave hadn’t gotten to him a decade and a half sooner - and it bubbles up in an aching, vicious possessiveness that Dave can’t remember ever feeling about anything else in his life.

“I love you,” Dave tells Klaus.

Klaus lets out a shaky breath and shuts his eyes, his palms a little sweaty against Dave’s, still working his hips into the lingering ghost of sensation. “I love you, too.”

“I might have said that to you as a teenager,” Dave says, trying and mostly failing to get himself back in check. “I was dramatic.”

Klaus giggles with his eyes squeezed shut. “Not even inside me, and you’re already making declarations. You can fuck me,” he adds, opening his eyes and looking glossily up at Dave. “I’m ready.”

“No, you’re not,” Dave says, without even thinking about it. “I need to use my fingers first. I don’t want to hurt you.”

Klaus lets go of Dave’s hands to throw his arms over his face. “Oh my god.”

“Tell me if I go too fast,” Dave says, kissing Klaus’s hip bone, reaching down to rub the tip of his middle finger between Klaus’s thighs.

“Yeah,” Klaus gasps. “Yeah, I will.”

For all Dave’s protests, he knows that the experienced adult version of Klaus currently in bed with him  _ is _ ready, so he slips his finger inside Klaus to the last knuckle, as deep as he can get it with the angle of his wrist. Klaus arches his back, the tendons in his neck standing out in sharp relief, but he keeps his arms over his face. He’s not crying; the few times Dave has seen Klaus cry, it took over Klaus’s entire body, impossible for him to hide. He’s just keeping his expressions to himself, which is fine, if it’s what he wants to do.

“Look at you,” Dave says, because even if Klaus can’t see his face, the feelings he knows are plastered across it, he can still hear his voice. He pulls his finger halfway out and pushes it back in. “Is that okay?”

Klaus nods under his arms, mute.

Dave considers taking that as an answer, but he wants to keep Klaus grounded. “Use your words, darlin’.”

“Okay,” Klaus says, his voice thin. “Very okay. Very good.”

“Do you want another one?”

“God, yes.”

Dave dips his free hand in the vaseline and slicks up his index finger so he can add it on the next push in. He takes his time with this one, scissoring as gently as he can to keep Klaus comfortable. There are times for too much too fast, which is another glorious lesson Klaus taught Dave from both sides of the equation, but Klaus had spent close to half an hour getting Dave ready before Klaus fucked him for the first time, so Dave draws this out more than he needs to, slow drags inside Klaus, teasing pressure over the spot that makes Klaus shiver and sigh.

“I can just do this,” Dave says, his cheek pressed to Klaus’s knee. “It doesn’t have to be anything more intense.”

Klaus shakes his head and finally takes his arms off his face. He’s flushed from his hair to his chest, glistening with sweat, eyelids closed and twitching with every movement of Dave’s fingers inside him. “I want you,” he says.

“Let me give you one more, then.” Dave leans down and kisses Klaus’s stomach as he slips his ring finger in alongside the first two. He knows it’s not a stretch for Klaus, not really, but Klaus gasps and moans like three fingers inside him is unprecedented. Dave wipes the extra vaseline off his free hand onto the sheets and grabs Klaus’s hip to keep him from moving, a harmless show of strength that turns Klaus to putty underneath him.

“It’s good,” Klaus tells him, unprompted.

“Is it?”

“So good.” Klaus holds on to the pillow behind his head with both hands and twists his hips to get Dave even deeper. His brow furrows, and he drops his feet from Dave’s shoulders to wrap his legs around Dave’s waist. Something about that angle must do it for him, because his eyes fly open and he practically yells, his stomach tensing as he tries to hold himself absolutely still while Dave curls his fingers inside him.

All the arousal Dave’s been putting off jackknifes to life in his pelvis. “Can I-”

“Please please please,” Klaus says in one shaky exhale. “I’m ready, I’m ready, please.”

Dave eases his fingers out of Klaus and uses the leftover vaseline to slick himself. He moves back up Klaus’s body until he’s hovering over him, their hips pressed together, faces inches apart.

Klaus looks miles away. Not in the way that worries Dave, when Klaus’s eyes unfocus and he jerks his head away from something Dave can’t see, but the way he sometimes gets while Dave works him over like this, which he promises Dave is a sign that Dave is doing something right - placid, perfectly content with his dark curls spilling out onto the pillow. Dave isn’t sure where Klaus is, exactly, but it looks like a good place.

Still, he checks in. “I wouldn’t have wanted to make you nervous,” he says, a tether from where Klaus has gone to where they are now, two adults with knowledge and history and love between them.

And Klaus, dear, beloved Klaus, says, “I wouldn't have been nervous, if it was with you.”

Dave ducks down and kisses Klaus, because not kissing Klaus is a constant battle that Dave only wins when he lets himself lose. He holds Klaus, and kisses him, and Klaus runs his palms up and down Dave’s back, soothing one or both of them.

“C’mon, baby,” Klaus says when they break apart.

Dave nods and reaches down to guide himself into Klaus’s body. It’s an easy slide after all the buildup, and Klaus sighs when Dave bottoms out, shifting his pelvis until the angle is right.

“Good?” Dave asks again, his voice coming out rough.

Klaus nods and wraps his legs tighter around Dave’s waist. “Very good.”

Dave pulls out and pushes back in, and Klaus rolls his head back and moans, decadent. When Dave tries to lift himself up for better leverage, Klaus latches his arms around Dave’s shoulders and clings, so Dave does what he can with most of his weight resting on Klaus. Judging by the sounds Klaus makes into his ear, it’s more than enough.

“You feel amazing,” Dave tells Klaus, because it’s true.

Klaus grins, easy for the praise, and turns his head to catch Dave’s mouth again. They kiss while they rock together, closer to what Dave is used to from Klaus, forceful and deep. Dave fucks him to the rhythm of their lips, and Klaus starts making soft noises into Dave’s mouth that have Dave wanting to barricade the door to their borrowed room until the mess outside is over and he can take Klaus safely home.

If Dave were really a teenager, this would have been over before it started, but he has a decade of practice putting off his own pleasure for his partner. So he works himself deeper, aiming up towards Klaus’s belly to rub at all the right places inside him, pressing Klaus down when he tries to meet Dave’s hips mid-thrust.

“Easy,” Dave tells him, lips on his neck. “I’ve got you.”

“Right,” Klaus says, his voice faint.

Dave runs a hand down to hold Klaus’s hip as he speeds up, fucks him a little faster, a little harder. “Tell me how it feels.”

Klaus groans and tightens his hold on Dave’s shoulders. “It feels,” he says, between shaky breaths, “like something’s trying to climb out of me.”

“Let it,” Dave tells him, kissing the hinge of his jaw.

Klaus tangles a hand in Dave’s hair, and this time, when he starts to work his hips back into Dave’s lap, Dave lets him, matches the pace he sets.

“Do you want me to touch you?” Dave asks him.

Klaus tucks his face into Dave’s neck and shakes his head. “I don’t think so. Just keep -” he gasps at the end of a sharp snap of Dave’s hips - “keep doing that.”

Dave knows from a wealth of experience and a conversation twenty minutes ago that Klaus can finish like this, but maybe he’s followed Klaus into his blissful, glassy place, because Klaus’s words shoot straight between Dave’s legs. All the creeping soreness in his abs disappears in favor of the ache in his pelvis, and he drives into Klaus as hard as he knows Klaus can handle. Klaus gets louder, trembling limbs wrapped around Dave’s body, hot breaths against Dave’s collarbone.

“You stopped talking,” Klaus manages to say, his words strained. “Talk to me.”

“Sweetheart,” Dave says. “You feel so good. You’re perfect. I can’t believe I found you.”

Klaus tightens his hand in Dave’s hair. “What’re the odds?”

“I want you,” Dave says, his words falling out of him in bursts, “like this. Over and over. Any way you’ll have me.”

Klaus spreads his legs wider, hooks his heels higher up on Dave’s back. Dave shifts his weight forward until Klaus is bent nearly in half under him, his beautiful flexible body curling and arching in Dave’s arms. Klaus digs his nails into Dave’s back and it feels like whatever’s climbing out of Klaus is going to find a new home in Dave, take root in all the fundamental parts of him and grow there, shape Dave from the core outward.

“I love you,” Dave says again, because he can’t not say it when Klaus is nestled into his chest like this, choosing to make himself fragile so that Dave can handle him gently. “I’m in love with you.”

Klaus plants his feet on Dave’s thighs and takes a deep breath to hold. Dave lifts himself up on his arms just enough to fuck Klaus properly, rocking the bedframe, pushing them up the mattress in increments until Klaus reaches up to brace himself against the headboard.

“Come on,” Dave breathes. “Let me feel it.”

Klaus comes dry without making a sound, his jaw tense, limbs going stiff. He clenches and flutters around where Dave is buried inside him, and Dave slows his hips to move with the waves of Klaus’s orgasm, riding every pulse of it until Klaus pulls in another breath and lets his feet slide off of Dave’s legs and onto the mattress.

Dave kisses both of Klaus’s closed eyelids. “Do you need me out?”

Klaus shakes his head, tries and fails to get control of his limbs enough to hold Dave against him. “I want,” he says, “the full experience.”

Dave laughs, a little hysterical, and starts fucking Klaus again, shallow thrusts that give Dave what he needs without hitting Klaus anywhere too sensitive. It isn’t going to take him long - it never does, whenever he gets to watch Klaus come first. Dave nips at Klaus’s lips until Klaus kisses him, and finishes like that, Klaus’s mouth moving with his, Klaus’s body warm and yielding against him. Klaus hums when he feels Dave’s hips stutter, slides his tongue along Dave’s lower lip.

“You gorgeous thing,” Klaus murmurs as Dave grinds his hips down and down. “You're so good to me.”

The things Dave wants to say are that Klaus is the gorgeous one, that Klaus has been good to Dave since he dropped into his life, that Dave is only doing what any decent person would do if they found themselves with Klaus’s trust. But Dave can’t speak, can barely think, so he takes the compliment, and keeps himself inside Klaus as his nerves crackle down to normal, held in the cradle of Klaus’s hips as Klaus rubs his back.

Dave’s brain stutters back to life as he pulls out of Klaus. He rolls to the side and moves to get up for a towel for Klaus, but Klaus grumbles and tugs at Dave's hands until he wraps his arms back around Klaus, instead.

“So,” Klaus says, his nose pressed to Dave's cheek, “Prom is in a month.”

Dave laughs helplessly and hauls Klaus closer until they're molded against one another.

“I mean,” Klaus continues, reaching up to hold Dave's jaw in his palm, “maybe if I show up in a dress they'll let us in on a technicality?”

“I don’t think we’d make it to the dance if you showed up at my house in a dress.”

Klaus grins, more and more present in himself as he catches his breath and talks to Dave. “What, you’re not gonna pick me up in your Chevy? Get me a corsage?”

Dave laughs and kisses Klaus’s chin, because it’s the closest thing in reach of his lips.

“You’ll have to talk to my dad,” Klaus says, “get his blessing. He’ll threaten to have my brother tear you in half with his extradimensional stomach monster if you try anything below the belt.”

“Your brother’s what?”

“But,” Klaus says, his voice dreamy and content, “I will put out anyway, because I hate my dad.”

Dave snorts. “And because you like me, right?”

“Because I love you.”

Dave smiles, stupid from sex and feelings. “You would’ve steamrolled me in high school.”

“Nah.” Klaus cuddles closer to Dave’s chest. “Sober, I would barely have been able to make it through a conversation with you.”

“That’s for the best,” Dave says. “You couldn’t have been pretty  _ and _ charming, I would have panicked and gone running, and then where would we be?”

“Hopefully here,” Klaus says, “somehow. Sooner or later.”

Dave tucks one of his arms under the pillow they’re sharing and runs his other hand all over Klaus’s body, his neck to his thighs and back again. Klaus smiles and tilts his chin so Dave can kiss him properly. Klaus slides a thigh between Dave’s, the only way to get them closer together without crawling into each other’s skin.

“I like to imagine,” Klaus says when they break apart, the swell of his lower lip still brushing against Dave’s mouth, “that I would have stumbled into you eventually, no matter what. It’s probably not true, but it’s nice to think about.”

“Maybe. Who knows how these things work?”

“Absolutely no one. Especially not people who say they do.”

“I’d like to live in a world,” Dave says, testing the waters, “where we always ended up together.”

“Me, too,” Klaus says immediately. “I have no idea how to explain how much I have decided that I want that.”

Dave puts that in his pocket to pull out later and study from every angle, like a letter from home. “Let’s get out of here in one piece, then.”

“Hey,” Klaus says, abruptly serious. He puts a hand on Dave’s cheek. “We’re going to.”

That hangs in the dark above them for a moment, and Dave needs, desperately, to chase the heaviness of it out of this night they’ve stolen for themselves. “And if we don’t, we’ll just find each other on the other side, right?”

Klaus stares at Dave so long that Dave starts to worry he’s said something irrevocably wrong.

“I don’t know,” Klaus says, eventually, “but I would try.”

He kisses Dave, then, his hand tightening in Dave’s hair, his whole wiry body tense with the force of it. Dave rubs his hand up and down Klaus’s side and lets Klaus kiss him breathless, lets him use his mouth on Dave’s to work through whatever the past half hour has dredged up in him.

They kiss until Dave’s lips are tingling, his heart pounding, his body making what he already knows is a doomed attempt at rallying for round three. Klaus is hard, rocking his hips into Dave’s like he’s not sure what else to do with them. Dave slides his hand down between Klaus’s thighs and slips two fingers back into Klaus’s body, and Klaus moans weakly into the kiss, moving so his leg is slung over Dave’s hip, giving Dave enough room to work.

“You got another one in you?” Dave asks Klaus, when Klaus breaks away to breathe.

“Yeah,” Klaus says, pressing his cheek into the pillow under Dave’s chin, his eyes shut tight. He shoves his own hand down between them and gets a hold on himself. “All for you, baby.”

Dave doesn’t tease this time, just crooks his fingers at the right angle and curls them back toward himself while Klaus makes muffled noises into the warm space between the pillow and Dave’s neck. Without himself to worry about, Dave can focus on the way Klaus takes him in, how every part of Klaus moves in rhythm with his own hand and Dave’s fingers inside him. Klaus knows himself well enough to be able to make his body do this, and Dave is learning, too. Dave wants to spend a day in bed and see just how many times Klaus could get off, how exhausted and pliant Klaus would be by the end of it, how Klaus would look at him. He wants to see Klaus sculpted by the sun through the window, at ease and in love.

True to his word, Klaus comes one more time, gasping, one hand flying slick over himself, the other digging nailprints into Dave’s arm. He goes limp against Dave’s chest, and Dave kisses every part of Klaus he can reach - his hair, his shoulder, his sweaty forehead. He keeps his fingers inside Klaus until Klaus reaches down and pulls them out himself, and then he wraps both of his arms around Klaus’s shoulders and holds him, feels Klaus’s heart hammering at the inside of his sternum.

“Don’ let me sleep,” Klaus mumbles into Dave’s neck, already halfway to passing out.

Dave could look at his watch, but it’s across the room in a pile with the rest of his clothes, waiting for morning. “Take a nap,” he says. “It’s still early. I’ll wake you up in a while.”

Klaus  _ mm _ s and lets Dave manhandle him into a more comfortable position for all four of their arms. As soon as Dave has them settled, Klaus taps out completely, his limbs going heavy.

Dave knows he won’t struggle to stay awake, not when the alternative is the rest of the night with Klaus lost. Instead, he stares down at the long planes of Klaus’s body, his legs tangled up with Dave’s. He should think something profound, looking at Klaus like this. Klaus is someone who should get written about and sculpted, someone who swallows all the empty space around him like a floodlight, the single most beautiful human being that Dave has ever seen. Klaus is also someone who used to trick his brothers into thinking he used their toothbrush handles to masturbate. Dave shouldn't be allowed to know either side of Klaus so intimately, let alone both.

Maybe Dave is going to cure some terrible disease in the far-flung future, and Klaus came back to thank him for it.

Klaus shifts in his sleep, makes a soft sound, nearly a word. This, at least, is normal, something Dave is prepared to handle. Every single person he's met over the past year gets nightmares.

Dave moves his hand from Klaus's hip to his hair, soft brown curls in his palm. He pets his fingers through them, hard enough to make an impression but not so hard that Klaus wakes up. Dave has come to on more than a few mornings with Klaus fast asleep next to him, Klaus's hands still in his hair. They both know how to find the balance between reassurance and gentleness.

That, Dave thinks, would come in handy on a Sunday morning. Or an early Sunday afternoon, as the case may be.

**Author's Note:**

> And then they were both fine forever.
> 
> (eta 5/3 you guys are so nice in the comments, oh my god, i've been getting lil confidence boosts for a month?? i love you all.)


End file.
